On today’s episode, Jonathan and Sy talk Christian Nationalism. They cover:
- What Christian Nationalism is exactly
- Why they personally reject it
- Why it’s so hard for White Christians to let go of the idea that the US is a Christian nation
- Why White Christians need to confess, repent of, and oppose Christian nationalism, rather than merely stating that it’s wrong or minimizing its importance
Mentioned in the Episode
- Jonathan’s book, Twelve Lies That Hold America Captive
- Dr. Anthea Butler’s article on why White evangelicals need to own Christian nationalism
- The Belhar Confession from South Africa
Credits
- Follow KTF Press on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. Subscribe to get our newsletter and bonus episodes at KTFPress.com
- Follow host Jonathan Walton on Facebook Instagram, and Threads
- Follow host Sy Hoekstra on Mastodon
- Our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra – listen to the whole song on Spotify
- Our podcast art is by Robyn Burgess – follow her and see her other work on Instagram
- Production and editing by Sy Hoekstra
- Transcript by Joyce Ambale and Sy Hoekstra
Introduction
[An acoustic guitar softly plays six notes, the first three ascending and the last three descending – F#, B, F#, E, D#, B – with a keyboard pod playing the note B in the background… both fade out as Jonathan Walton says “This is a KTF Press podcast.”]
Sy Hoekstra: White Christians in our democracy today have power and we want to know what to do with that power. And the answer has to be, “Oh, we have to use it to enact what Jesus would enact.” It is trying to apply teachings from a person who was occupied, who was in no position of power, and who was not interested in establishing a government on Earth…
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs]. Yes, that’s true.
Sy Hoekstra: …to the question of how you establish a government on Earth [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/ That it will roll in abundance/ And that you’re building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]
Sy Hoekstra: Welcome to Shake the Dust, leaving colonized faith for the kingdom of God. I'm Sy Hoekstra.
Jonathan Walton: And I'm Jonathan Walton. Today, we're going to be talking about Christian nationalism. What it is exactly, why it's much closer to what the average White American Christian believes than you might think, and some others might think, and why rejecting it is mostly an excuse not to engage in some deeper and very necessary self-reflection about the church's political witness in America.
Sy Hoekstra: Just some small things like that, that's what we're talking about. Before we get to that, I just wanted to encourage everyone, as we've been doing all these bonus episodes, to go to Apple or Spotify and give this show a five-star rating. It really helps us as we try and spread the word about the show when people look at it and see that other people find it valuable, and we would really, really appreciate it. We've gotten some, a few more of these ratings as we've been asking you all to do it, and we would just please encourage anyone who hasn't done it to keep going. It's a really easy and free way to support what we do at KTF Press helping people leave the idols of the White American church to follow Jesus, and we very much appreciate it.
If you're on Apple, if you could give us a written review as well, those are so encouraging to us and they give other people a great kind of flavor of what the show is about from the perspective of readers. So Apple or Spotify, give us a five-star rating, and leave a written review if you're on Apple, please, it helps us so much. And we very much appreciate it.
Jonathan, what are we up to? Let's get into it.
What Is Christian Nationalism?
Jonathan Walton: Sy, I mean, this is going to be a light-hearted, very simple, straightforward conversation. Alright [laughs], So can we start out with just a simple question to get everybody on the same page because there are lots of different definitions out there. So what is Christian nationalism?
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. I'm going to talk about what it is technically, meaning there are lots of people operating with many definitions of it out there. There are also lots of people using the word without having a particular definition of it [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: This is also true [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: Which just happens a lot in political discussions, it's sort of unavoidable. But there is a technical definition of nationalism and Christian nationalism. So I'm going to start with nationalism broadly. This is where kind of my background and history in law and politics comes into some usefulness on this show. I'm going to give you a definition of nationalism and you're going to think, “That doesn't sound that weird or important or interesting.” So let me just tell you, I promise you, it is [laughter]. I'm going to give you the definition first then we're going to talk about it more.
So effectively, nationalism is the belief that people should identify with their nation state over other nations. It's like creating a sense of political identity in the people who constitute a nation. And the thing that they're identifying with is the whole nation of people over whom the government operates as a state. So not that odd or controversial, particularly in America, lots of people think that way. To understand it a little bit better, you have to kind of understand the historical context that it comes up in. Obviously, like when nation states were first arising in Europe, there were lots of other competing loyalties. You could be loyal to your church or your kingdom or whatever else, so it was important to construct an identity around this new thing called a nation. Or at least it was important to the people who were trying to build the nations.
So when you're constructing an identity around a nation, you have to find something for people to sort of hold on to as they’re building a common identity. So what that means is nationalism gets combined with a lot of other stuff. And again, this is important. This is not just like random historical information. This will come into play when we talk about the details of our current debate today. Nationalism gets combined with a lot of other things, it gets combined… Like I'll give you an example. I'll give a couple examples, because there are examples that we might find sympathetic and examples that we will find horrible [laughs]. So for instance, there were lots of anti-colonial movements, where they relied on nationalism to create a sense of solidarity among all of the people in a given colony that we're trying to fight, say like Britain.
Like what Gandhi did was nationalism. Gandhi fought very intentionally for a unified Indian state that was not about religion or any other divisive thing. It was about all of the people who are native to this place called India fighting against… having self-determination, governing themselves apart from the British Empire. That's what he was fighting for. That happened in anti-colonial movements in a lot of different places. He's just one of the more famous figureheads of it.
Nationalism can also be combined with, it's not about like fighting a distant empire or trying to counter an identity as being part of a British, being a British subject or whatever. It could be part of creating an ethnocentric community, meaning like… the most famous example of ethno-nationalism is the Nazis. Nazi being a word that is short for the German word “nazional,” meaning national, because they were the National Socialists. So basically, that's creating a national identity around being Aryan. Around being anti-Semitic. So anyways, there are a million different ways that nationalism gets combined with other stuff. And there are lots of different versions of religious nationalism around the world. In America, we have Christian nationalism, which is basically a belief that America is or at least it should be a Christian nation, and that you should have your identity as an American, specifically in the fact that America is a Christian nation. And that that's part of your primary identity, “I am an American, which is to say that I am part of this Christian nation, and that's a primary identity of mine.”
So again, not everybody is thinking that way. Like a lot of people are just saying, I'm a Christian nationalist, because that basically just means I support Trump and his movement [laughs]. Or there's lots of other ways that people talk about it, but that is the kind of technical definition. Jonathan, do you have anything to add, or should we just move on from my history and poli-Sy lecture [laughs]?
Jonathan Walton: No, I think the only thing that I would add is that nationalism is… Or I guess, could you tell me the difference between nationalism and patriotism?
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, I mean, patriotism could apply to any sort of political organization, I guess. But patriotism is more usually a question of love of country, meaning they go together a lot. But basically, it's more just about your identity with a nation state in particular. So you can love your nation state, you could also love your kingdom [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Right.
Sy Hoekstra: You know what I mean? You could love your tribe, you could love your whatever. Like there's lots of different ways to… I don't know. Love the political organization that you're under. So it's more they're just sort of separate questions is the real answer.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. No, no, that makes sense. The only thing I would add to it I think, is patriotism slash… because sometimes I feel like they get conflated, especially when we get into Christian nationalism, is that this is a normal way of thinking for most people, but is most likely heavily subconscious.
Sy Hoekstra: Yes.
Jonathan Walton: So as you're listening to Sy’s definition, even as I'm thinking about it, I'm like, yeah, these are all quote unquote, “normal” ways to think and be in the world. And without interrogation, it becomes the basis for a lot of actions or inaction that we take each day.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, totally agreed with that.
Why Should We Reject Christian Nationalism?
Sy Hoekstra: So before we get into the kind of meatier part of the discussion of why rejecting it isn't enough and why it's actually very common, Jonathan, there's a book that was written called Twelve Lies That Hold America Captive: And the Truth That Sets Us Free.
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs] Yes. I’ve heard of it.
Sy Hoekstra: And it was written by Jonathan Walton. Yeah. And one of the titular lies of this book [laughter], one of the twelve lies was that America is a Christian nation. Effectively, you have a chapter in a book rejecting the ideology of Christian nationalism [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Yes. It's chapter one actually [laughs]. It’s the most important chapter of the book.
Sy Hoekstra: Is it really chapter one?
Jonathan Walton: It’s chapter one, yeah.
Sy Hoekstra: I’d forgotten that actually.
Jonathan Walton: No worries, no worries.
Sy Hoekstra: Can you give us the bullet points, Jonathan, why is it something Christians should reject?
Jesus Did Not Want Us to Establish a Kingdom on Earth
Jonathan Walton: We should reject Christian nationalism because it's antithetical to the gospel of Jesus Christ. I think it's very clear in Scripture that if Jesus was trying to start a political revolution and baptize a nation state, he could have done that. There's a prime moment in Scripture when Jesus is arrested and Peter pulls out a sword and chops off the ear of Malchus, the people who were there to arrest Jesus. In that moment, if there was going to be a revolution that would have been the moment. There's a detachment of soldiers there, Jesus' disciples were there. There could have been a start to a fight. This was the height of Jesus' ministry, and instead of overthrowing the Empire, which is what Peter, Simon the Zealot, and thousands of Jews at the time were waiting for, he didn't do that.
He picked up Malchus’ ear and put it back on his head. Jesus was not there to bring his kingdom of the world, because he told Pontius Pilate after he got arrested, “My kingdom is not of this world.” So when we as followers of Jesus say the United States is a shining city on a hill as Barack Obama did in his speech in 2008, echoing John F. Kennedy from the 1960s, we are doing the work of Christian nationalism. We are baptizing, we are sanctifying a land theft, genocide, patriarchal, racist, hyper capitalist, militarized project, to create a quote-unquote, “new people in a new place,” which God did not ordain or endorse in any way as the way of his kingdom coming into the world.
Sy Hoekstra: Can I ask you one step further? I agree with all that.
Jonathan Walton: Sure.
Sy Hoekstra: Wouldn't it be best for a nation to operate according to Christian principles, wouldn’t that be the best way to make people flourish?
Jonathan Walton: I would argue that the answer is no.
Sy Hoekstra: Why?
Jonathan Walton: If that was the best way for us to flourish in the world, then that would have been Jesus' mandate, but he did not say that.
Sy Hoekstra: So that's interesting. The reason it's interesting is like, I feel like it's baffling to White Christians to say…
Jonathan Walton: Oh! Listen, man…
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. I’m just saying I don't necessarily disagree with you, but man, in the context of the church that I grew up in, what you're saying is ridiculous.
Jonathan Walton: Yes, because of where we live and how things have operated the last however many years. Let's take for example the idea of Manifest Destiny, and the glorification of capitalism and a Protestant ethic. And we look at a forest and we say this forest should be timber. This forest should be grazing lands for cattle. This forest should be cut down and replaced with pines that we can select cut for every five years and clear cut every 20 years to maximize and boost profits. Like we need to make this island, which apparently is vast, make it as efficient and productive as possible. That reality is externalized Christian nationalism, and the ethic of the story that you just said.
Like it makes no sense that we shouldn't have every single person believe this one way so we can be the best people to do the most things to be the most accomplished all the time. People are not trees to be harvested, to be bred and then harvested so that we can reap the most benefits as defined by a certain group of people. That is why we should have a theocratic racialized state.
Sy Hoekstra: Jonathan, did you grow up on a pine tree farm?
Jonathan Walton: I did.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah [laughter]. I think you just made that obvious through some of the stuff you said.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah.
Sy Hoekstra: I was like, “to clear cut and what now?” I don't know what any of those words mean.”
Jonathan Walton: Yeah.
Sy Hoekstra: That's fine. You don't have to explain [laughter]. Okay, so I just want to be real clear about this Jonathan. You're saying that laws and policies and procedures and whatever, that reflect Jesus' teaching are not the best way to go for our country?
Jonathan Walton: I am saying… that… precisely.
Sy Hoekstra: Why [laughter]?
Jonathan Walton: And the reason I'm saying that is because the Kingdom of God as reflected by Jesus did not function that way. And if it did, then the actions that Jesus took would make no sense.
Sy Hoekstra: Okay. So you've made that point I think. And I think I want to drill down on the way—the kingdom doesn't work that way. Meaning, I think what you're saying is the nature of God's Kingdom is fundamentally not about earthly power.
Jonathan Walton: Yes. So I think that underneath the Christian nationalist impulse, is a desire for control of other people. That's the impulse. Like other people... and I will say that some of this is a twisted form of evangelism, because we’ve framed hell and we’ve framed, like it is the worst possible thing for someone to go to hell. Now, I am not saying it’s not a bad thing for people to not choose Jesus and be separated from God for eternity. That is not what I'm saying. But what I am saying is, it's been framed in such a way that it creates an unnecessary level of anxiety when someone has not decided to follow Jesus.
Sy Hoekstra: Specifically, because we think it's our responsibility to make them do that.
Jonathan Walton: Yes, because it's framed as my, like if I do not bear witness then it's my fault this person didn't say yes. If I had just shared the right thing, or gave the right track or played the right song or prayed the right prayer. Like it is not your strategy that leads people to repentance, it is the kindness of God. It is a work of the Spirit. It does not say if we lift up this denomination, all people will be drawn to him. It says, “If the Son of Man be lifted up, he will draw all people unto him.” So I think there's an unconscious and unnecessary binding anxiety around whether or not we are Christian enough, and loved enough, and all those things. So I think that the desire to share our faith is literally the Great Commission. Go out, baptize people in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Like go and do that. Make disciples.
I'm a fan of the Great Commission. I'm an evangelist, I preach the gospel. We do that. What I am not saying, is that that then gives us the reason and justification for indoctrination and compulsive religious identity. Like it's just not there. If it was there, Jesus would have done it. Because I am a Christian. I am not a Pauline, I am not all these other things. I have decided to follow Jesus. If I look at the life of Jesus, he did not come to create a theocratic, multiracial society. He didn't do that.
Sy Hoekstra: I think this is where the rubber hits the road, which is that we in our… that White Christians in our democracy today have power and we want to know what to do with that power. And the answer has to be, oh, we have to use it to enact what Jesus would enact.
Jonathan Walton: Right.
Sy Hoekstra: Or something like that. And it is trying to apply teachings from a person who was occupied, who was in no position of power, and who was not interested in establishing a government on Earth…
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs]. Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: …to the question of how you establish a government on Earth [laughs]?
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: I think I want to be clear because what I'm a little bit trying to get at here is I know what you're not saying is, like if there's a choice between a law that reflects something that Jesus taught that will help people that is good, and a law that does the opposite of that. You're not saying, “Who cares what the law is?”
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. So for example, Donald Trump in his 2025 document says he wants to round up undocumented people and put them into camps.
Sy Hoekstra: You're referring to the plan that he has for basically day one.
Jonathan Walton: Well, the plan that was written for him by a group of conservative activists.
Sy Hoekstra: by kind of a super PAC, yeah.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. If that happened, I personally would lead a movement against that. I would do that. Now, I am not saying that if people vote for him, therefore we should overflow the government. That's not what I'm saying. Because if the majority of people vote for Donald Trump, then Donald Trump becomes the President of the United States. I don't think the United States is more or less Christian because he becomes the president. The United States as a nation will never be and has never been Christian. The seeds have been planted. They're just bearing fruit every day. And so, but I am resistant to patterns and practices that don't reflect the kingdom of God as best as that possibly can be in the world.
But what I am not going to do is to force or compel people to live and be in the way that I would have them to be and then baptize that as doctrine. I can't do that.
Sy Hoekstra: Again, I know there are White people listening to this, who are going to be like, “These two are just ridiculous.”
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: “How can you not believe that we should use our power for good for the kingdom?” Whatever. And I think what you're hearing from Jonathan is the perspective of someone who comes from a church tradition that was not in power, and is therefore [laughter] in my view, more easily able to understand what Jesus was getting at. And it's very hard when, you know what I mean? It's a hard thing for White people like us and I just wanted to highlight that. Because we have such a long, long tradition in the White Church of people trying to figure out how do you govern a nation state in a Christian way? Like how do you create the most possible Christian nation?
That is such a preoccupation of some of the reformers [laughs], right? Of so many theologians, of so many people. Like that is… And I think the kingdom is not a nation state. Like that's what it comes down to. And you hear those sentiments too. Like I heard, it was honestly very confusing growing up [laughter]. I would hear these sentiments about how the kingdom of God doesn't come through politics and the nation state, and also, “We need to make sure that our nation is as Christian as we possibly can in its laws and institutions and everything else.” And those two messages are hard to reconcile.
Jonathan Walton: Yes, and which is why it's hard for us to explain colonized faith, but that's what we're talking about.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah [laughs].
The Constitution Sets up a System Opposed to Christian Nationalism
Sy Hoekstra: It's not only like… one of the reasons that I would reject Christian nationalism [laughs] is due to the reality that the system that we set up in America is not a Christian nationalist system. Meaning we have set up a majority rule system in America. We've always had lots of Christianity influencing the culture of our government, influencing the culture of, our culture in general. Like we've been a predominantly Christian society, but at the base of the country we set up in the Constitution, like there's nothing about that in there. We have a majority rule country [laughs]. If the majority of people in your country are not Christians, you're not going to end up with laws that are in line with those Christians’ interpretations of the Bible.
So we're literally not a Christian nationalist state, that's what I'm trying to say [laughs]. We are a representative democracy. Representative republic technically, but whatever. We're a democracy.
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs]. That's lie number five, but go ahead.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah [laughter]. But you know what I’m saying.
Jonathan Walton: I do. I do know what you mean.
Sy Hoekstra: That’s a system that, yeah. We have not extended that democracy to all of the actual citizens of America, nor have we extended citizenship to all the people that we should at all times. But we have a majority rule system. Yes, there are ways that that gets distorted by all kinds of things like racism and money and whatever.
Jonathan Walton: Right. But everybody who's listening to that knows that, where we mean [laughs]. So we’re good.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, probably. Man, I have so many thoughts on this subject too, I'm wondering if we should just move on or if I should touch on one of these two things. I mean, actually, one important thing to say is we are a pluralist secular democracy. I just touched on this a little bit. But basically, if you don't have the majority of the people who are voting, whoever they are, you lose. That's how it works. So Christian nationalism is intentioned with that idea, with that system. Like with the actual system that we set up. Because if you as Christians don't have the votes to get whatever it is that you want, the Constitution says you should lose. So I don't know. It's just, it’s complicated in that way, but you were about to say something.
Jonathan Walton: Oh no, I was just going to add on to that. That one of the things that happens is that we make the leaders who planted our nation Christian as well, and that's just not true.
Sy Hoekstra: Right. Like some of them were [laughter], but certainly not all of them.
Jonathan Walton: Right. So for example, someone like Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin, these were people who were not religious people. These were people who actually talked about not being religious. I think the most famous thing is Thomas Jefferson having a Bible that he cut out all of the Jesus and miracles out of. The Thomas Jefferson Bible is a real thing. I think the thing that, for him, I think he described himself as a deist, basically. So believing in a higher power, but there was no difference between Jesus and Muhammad and all the other things that were downstream in his reality at the time, including philosophers that justified slavery. So I think we can't deify the land that we're on, or the colonial project that we're on, and we also can't deify the people and individuals who made it possible, or baptize texts, like the Constitution and Bill of Rights to the point that they become sacred.
Nationalism Makes Us Ask “Who Is My Neighbor?”
Sy Hoekstra: So one more quick point for me is actually regardless of whether the nationalism is Christian or not, it is something that is actively competing for your identity as a Christian. It is making your identity competitive compared to other nations. You are supposed to root for and think that your nation should succeed, or it is the primary thing that you identify with over other nations. And I don't really think there's any basis for that in Christian belief [laughs]. I don't think there's any particular reason for me to say… I think having a strong nationalist identity while it may seem like an obvious thing to a lot of White Christians, I think it is a subtle way of asking, “Who is my neighbor?”
I think it's a way of demarking here are people that I need to care about more than others, and there's just not really any basis for that in Scripture. And Jesus is constantly challenging us to see beyond those divisions that we create, as we know, because his answer to the question, “Who is my neighbor?” is the parable of the Good Samaritan, which is actually a parable about someone from one nation helping out somebody from another nation, even when the people in their own nation didn't [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Exactly [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: So, alright, let us move on, unless you have anything else to say about why we should reject Christian nationalism [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: No, I’m good [laughs].
Why Is Rejecting the Idea That the US is a Christian Nation So Hard for White Americans?
Believing America is Christian Is Easier Than Facing America’s Sins
Sy Hoekstra: Alright. Jonathan, why is rejecting the idea of the US as a Christian nation so hard for so many White Christians to do?
Jonathan Walton: Yeah [laughs]. The reason that I made this the first lie of the book is because it is the lie that holds all the other ones together. So if I as a… and I would say this as a Black person. If I as a Black person say that the United States is not a Christian nation, then what happens is all of the things that I justified with my faith, so let's throw out things that are not in the Bible, but people in a quote-unquote, “Christian” nation believe. God meets us halfway. God rewards hard work. That everything happens for a reason. None of those things were in the Bible, but those are absolutely tenets of White American folk religion, a race, class, gender, environmental-based hierarchy that segregates the stratified society that we live in. So if I take the divination out of that, like all of a sudden these are not sacred things and I have to deal with the reality of them.
Sy Hoekstra: Okay, so you mean divination in this, you mean making something divine.
Jonathan Walton: Is divination the right word? Is it the right word?
Sy Hoekstra: I'm not sure, but it's the word you said so we're going to go with it [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: It is. Alright, cool. Hey friends. Word of the day, divination. Is it a real word? Who knows.
Sy Hoekstra: [Laughs].
Jonathan Walton: But let's say when we make things divine, when we make things sacred, when we make them all of a sudden consecrated, then when we take that away, all of the other things beneath that unravel. The idea that we are all immigrants. The idea that something beautiful and wonderful is being created and therefore, we don't have to think about boarding schools, or residential schools for Native Americans. We don't have to think about the enslavement of Africans. We don't have to think about subjugation because what we're doing was holy. What we were working on was objectively morally pure. So the baggage, the things that happened, that was all for a wonderful, amazing, beautiful, just, loving, kind cause.
Sy Hoekstra: Or it was like a deviation from those things that we then corrected and now everything’s fine.
Jonathan Walton: Right. That we then corrected, and you know, we're making progress. This is Nikki Haley's problem. Like she said, “I just can't have people walking around believing that.”
Sy Hoekstra: Believing, in her case, “that” is that America is a racist country.
Jonathan Walton: Is a racist country. Right. Because what she's actually saying is, everything that we're doing must have been worth it. Must have been good. There must have been this greater ideal that's at work. And the reality is, no it wasn't. There was no greater ideal at work. God was not blessing and sending colonists to go out and do this work. They were going out in the name of greed and plunder. That is why they were going. We can dress it up really prettily, but if we actually begin to deny that Christ sent us on this mission, then we actually have to deal with our sin. We actually have to deal with it. And for White Christians, because of the segregated, stratified society that we live in, I think that White people can't do it because they actually don't believe that the God they serve is big enough to forgive them for the atrocities that they've committed, participated in and benefited from.
That I think is an affront to the work of Jesus, but I think we don't have a theology that's big enough in the White American church and then every church that's downstream of that, to actually have a grace that's large enough to cover, or a love that is sufficient, or a strength that's made perfect in our weakness. We don't have a theology that can hold water against that.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, strength being made perfect in weakness, or the meek inheriting the earth.
Jonathan Walton: Right.
Sy Hoekstra: Those sorts of things. And then your ability to be vulnerable and to be sinful, and be forgiven. All that kind of falls by the wayside when what you were actually after was power and money and dominance.
Jonathan Walton: Yes. Right.
Believing America Is Christian Lets Christians Justify Clinging to Power
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. All that is very good. I think I would add a couple of things. Another reason that it's really hard for people to reject, just on a practical level, is the instinct behind the question that I asked you before, which is, wouldn't it actually be better if Christian rules and Christian laws just ruled the land? If Christian people and Christian laws ruled the land. We have a really hard time, ‘we’ being White Christians, have a really hard time letting go of that idea. By the way, we're talking about White Christians right now, because that is where Christian nationalism is overwhelmingly most prevalent [laughs]. It exists in other places, it exists in other like demographics in the US, and there's also Christian nationalism in other countries. But that's what we're talking about within our context of the US. You will find Christian nationalism in like Brazil, for example.
Jonathan Walton: Or Poland, yes.
Sy Hoekstra: Or Poland, or Russia, or yeah. So when it comes to a law that Christians want passed that we think is really important, if we don't have the numbers for it, and I think a lot of where this happens now is around LGBTQ+ issues. Because there are so many Christians trying to pass anti-queer legislation of various kinds. And there's so much anxiety around schools teaching your kids that there's not a gender binary or whatever. That is where Christians cannot accept losing. White Christians had the dominant beliefs on pretty much all issues of sexuality up until like 15 years ago, then public opinion just changed so quickly [laughs].
And now White Conservative Christians find themselves on the losing side of those issues and they're just like, “No, we cannot accept this. We have to find ways to stop it.” Even though, again, the majority rule, like if you're in the minority, your policies lose. That's crucial to a functioning pluralist democracy. But that's not really what people want [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: No.
Sy Hoekstra: That's not really what White Christians want, speaking very broadly. It's also why authoritarianism is so attractive [laughs]. It's why it doesn't matter that Donald Trump loses the popular vote, but wins the presidency. That's actually good. Having a strong man who's willing to beat up on your opponents, that's what you need when you're losing.
Jonathan Walton: Right.
Sy Hoekstra: So it makes that instinct, I don't know, more natural, I guess. That instinct towards authoritarianism. You were about to say something Jonathan.
Jonathan Walton: Just very quickly, I think just for people of color listening to this episode, this is attractive to be aligned with the people who are winning and to get away from suffering and marginalization.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.
Jonathan Walton: When we talk about what Sy was just naming, discrimination against the alphabet community, like the, sorry, alphabet community being LGBTQIA+ people. So when we talk about discrimination against them, it's easier to just say, “You know what, let me go with the strong people and not stand up for the vulnerable people because then they won't pick on me.” It's moving from being someone who's in the fields on a plantation to being an overseer. And overseers can be worse than the folks that actually are the people owning and holding the plantation. So I think that's something for us to name as well, as that it is attractive to think that we should be the master.
It's attractive to think that we should be the ones in control and be dominant. And that is never the role that a follower of Jesus was supposed to play. But it's how we ended up with me in high school getting a t shirt that says “The Lord's Gym” on it, and Jesus is jacked.
Sy Hoekstra: [Laughs].
Jonathan Walton: And doing pushups with a cross on his back. That’s a real t-shirt. So [laughs] that’s how we end up with these visions of a strong man and then it gets marketed because we want to believe in a God like that. But we actually serve a God who died, who laid down his life, who was described as a lamb. So I think there's inherent tension there. I just want to name that. Things that Sy is saying are attractive because it's great to feel like we win. But that's not what God has called us to.
Sy Hoekstra: And I think coming off of that, is part of the reason that it's again, so hard for White people to reject is, we do not want to be in the position that we have put so many other people in. We don't want to be the people who are working in the fields. You know what I mean?
Jonathan Walton: Right.
Sy Hoekstra: Which is why we never have the instinct, this has always been so interesting to me, like so revealing. We never have, like when I say we, again… if you're a conservative White Christian, who now finds yourself in the minority on issues of sexuality, which I'm not one of those. But if you are one, then it is just never, it's interesting to me that it is never the instinct to go to the Black church and say, “Hey, how have you dealt with schools teaching your kids stuff that's not true?” Because Black people have dealt with that, for sure.
Jonathan Walton: This is true.
Sy Hoekstra: Why is it never our instinct to go ask them, “Hey, when you find yourself in this position, when the government is saying something that you disagree with that is violating something that you hold to be sacred or whatever.” That's never the instinct. You’re never going to find White Christians going to the Black church to ask a question like that, or you're going to find it very, very rarely. Because the thing that we want to do is make sure that that is never us. So what we're going to do instead is get a mob and take over a school board meeting.
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs] Yes, hashtag Moms for Liberty.
Sy Hoekstra: Options that have never been available to Black people [laughter].
Jonathan Walton: Right. This is true.
Sy Hoekstra: So yeah, that is a revealing impulse that we don't have [laughs]. It is a revealing lack of an impulse.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Michael Wear talked about this. And he was right. He said, “For all the people, for my White conservative Christians out there,” and Michael Wear is White. He said, “If you're sitting there asking yourself, ‘I feel politically homeless,’” He said, “That's okay.” Go and ask Black people what it's like to be politically homeless. Go and do that.” And I've never heard a White person say anything like what Sy was just saying until 10 years ago, and I was like, “It would be great to be asked that question [laughter]. I’d feel so affirmed. Yeah. Come. Come sit with me in the desert” [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: Which you would also have to know though, like you would even have to understand that Black people are politically homeless.
Jonathan Walton: Yes. Right.
Sy Hoekstra: Because most White people are just like, “What do you mean? Black people are Democrats. they vote Democrat. Aren't they one of the most loyal voting blocks for the Democrats?” Well, yes, but [laughter] with a lot of significant caveats. They're not particularly happy to be there. It's the better of two very bad options.
Jonathan Walton: This is a survival vote.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, exactly.
Jonathan Walton: Because prior to that, we were all Republicans [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: Right. Because they were the party that eliminated slavery.
Jonathan Walton: Exactly, right.
Sy Hoekstra: And then things shifted over time. I mean, it's been like 60-ish years now…
Jonathan Walton: 60 years, yeah almost.
Sy Hoekstra: …basically, since the Republicans ran a candidate who actively opposed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, which was kind of the last straw for the Black people who were left in the Republican Party, for a lot of them anyways.
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: Ever since then Black people have voted for like, just barely in the double digits for Republican presidential candidates. It used to be much higher than that. And barely in the double digits percentage wise. But again, that was because the other guy was actively saying “civil rights are bad.”
Jonathan Walton: Yes [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: It's not because LBJ was going to have Black people's interests at heart. In fact, LBJ was really hard on the Civil Rights movement.
Jonathan Walton: Yes. He was not a fan [laughter].
Sy Hoekstra: He was one of the primary obstacles they had to get out of their way in order to get what they wanted. Anything else to say on that subject or should we...
Jonathan Walton: No. No, we can go on.
Why Do White Christians Need to Own Christian Nationalism, Not Just Repent of It?
Sy Hoekstra: Let's get into this because I think this is actually super important for people to understand this next question. Which is, Jonathan, why is rejecting Christian nationalism not enough? Why is that like a wholly insufficient response to the political landscape when it comes to what White Christians need to do to achieve anything that's kind of like what Jesus would probably have us do in this moment?
We Have to Oppose Sin, Not Just Identify It
Jonathan Walton: Yeah, I think Brandi talks about this in her podcast that she did on the idols of White evangelicalism.
Sy Hoekstra: Brandi Miller.
Jonathan Walton: Brandi Miller, in our Anthology. She's amazing, wonderful, chief storyteller of Quest Church. I think the reason it's not enough is the exact same reason why it's not enough just to believe that punching people in the face on the street is not enough.
Sy Hoekstra: What [laughs]?
Jonathan Walton: So I'm trying to think of something that's ridiculous. That it's not enough just to believe that it's not okay. You actually have to resist it.
Sy Hoekstra: Okay [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: You can't just say, “Oh, yeah, we shouldn't abuse children.” And then children are being abused, and you do nothing. It requires an active interruption of the nonsense. So if we're sitting in a room at Thanksgiving and someone is actively saying, “Hey, we should exterminate these people,” that requires an active resistance. It doesn't require a passive knowledge of the issue. It's not something that requires, it's like being on a bike and not pedaling.
Sy Hoekstra: [Laughs].
Jonathan Walton: It's like you’re sitting on the bike. Like, ride the bike! So all that to say, the reason that it's insufficient is because faith without works is dead. Like it's dead. We actually have to do something about the faith that we have. And the kingdom of God is an active moving force in the world. The Gospel requires an action. So for us to say, “Oh, yeah, Christian nationalism is not right, is heretical, is anti-kingdom-of-God,” requires us to move our feet against that. As opposed to just thinking on your own that this isn't okay and then allowing it to literally plant churches, sell books, build conferences, that our families and friends attend and support.
White Christians Use Rejecting Christian Nationalism To Absolve Themselves of Guilt and Avoid Self-Reflection
Sy Hoekstra: I listened to interestingly, after we decided to make this month's bonus episode on this subject, The Gospel Coalition came out with a podcast about Christian nationalism, with four of their leaders kind of discussing it. And the Gospel Coalition if you don't know, is a ministry that puts out a lot of media and discipleship tools and runs conferences and things for people. It started in the US 20 years ago-ish. It's now kind of all over the world. And it was kind of centrist with the right leaning instincts at the beginning and it's drifting further and further to the right as America becomes more polarized. That's how I would describe it. That's not how they would describe themselves, that last part about politics.
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: They would describe themselves as Orthodox, theologically conservative Christians. It's also, again, not the way they would describe themselves, is very White dominated and very culturally White. But so it was an interesting little test case for me to listen to. And the way that they kind of get around not having to actively push against it in this podcast or in this discussion, was by minimizing its impact and basically saying that nobody really believes this stuff. And like, there's one guy who's actually asking on the podcast, “What politician would even advocate for this? Why is it…?”
Jonathan Walton: [Laughs] Sorry, I didn’t listen to the podcast, but there’s so many politicians that actively do that.
Sy Hoekstra: Well, yeah. Because I was like, “the Speaker of the House of Representatives [laughs]. Third in line for the presidency, that’s who would advocate for it.”
Jonathan Walton: He has a Christian nationalist flag in his office.
Sy Hoekstra: Right. So anyways, there's a lot of politics. It's not like a majority of Republican politicians. It's a ton though, of pretty high up and important people. And it's certainly Donald Trump who was the president. But it's interesting because it was, so then went on to say it's totally insignificant. So why does everybody talk about it? Well, it's just punishing us for voting meaning... He specifically said, he didn't say White evangelicals, he just said the 81 percent. But the 81 percent number is White evangelicals [laughs]. It's 81 percent of White evangelicals who voted for Donald Trump in 2016. And he said, basically, calling us Christian nationalists and bashing Christian nationalism is punishment for the 81 percent, for voting for Donald Trump.
So that's why rejecting, the way that it gets rejected is why I kind of disagree with rejecting it, or like why I say rejecting it isn’t enough. Because the way that it gets rejected is to basically scrub the image of conservative Christian Republicans in the United States. Kind of the same way that somebody who is implicitly very racist or holds very racist views, but doesn't explicitly state that “I believe in White supremacy,” would use like the Klan as a way to scrub their own image. “I'm not them.” That that little minority of really, actually bad people over there. I'm not them. Therefore I'm not a racist, I'm not a bad person, like you have to have the, assume the best of me.”
It is a way to cleanse your image and make kind of conversations about the harms that Donald Trump or that the right wing of the party is causing, not about you and say, “I don't have to own this.” A long time ago, kind of when the Christian nationalist conversation was bubbling up in Christian circles before it got to the mainstream, professor Anthea Butler, who we've mentioned before, wrote this great little article that has really stuck with me about what White evangelicals need to do is own Christian nationalism. If you want to get to a place where you will have a political witness that is reflective of Jesus, you have to own and repent of it. Actually, I'm not even sure if she's, I think she just said “White evangelical”. I'm not sure she said “Conservatives”.
But regardless, I would say every White Christian [laughs] needs to a certain degree really think about what Christian nationalism, like what its beliefs are and how it's reflected in what we believe, and then repent of those things. Because again, continuing on with this [Gospel Coalition] conversation, they did say a lot of things about rejecting Christian nationalism as idolatry and having your identity in the kingdom be greater than your identity as an American, and not recognizing borders on basically who you should love as an image bearer of God. A lot of great things like that. But then they kept coming back to these issues of DEI and especially to issues of queer, basically queer people. Queer people's rights, and trans rights in particular, and people teaching children about people who are transgender or people teaching against the gender binary in schools.
And they just kept asking all these questions about like, “Okay, but what do we do about this? We have to do something about this. This can't stand.” [laughter]
Jonathan Walton: Right. “It could not be.”
Sy Hoekstra: It was like, if I am to love my neighbor, it's all fine to say that we are here for the good of the people to promote the common good, whatever. But when I disagree with my neighbor about what constitutes justice, what do I do? And there was just this constant underlying anxiety about that question. And I think that is reflective of the ways in which even fairly moderate White evangelicals have that instinct of Christian nationalism. Like I have to do something, this can't be left to stand because people are going to be hurt if the Christian, what I view as my interpretation of the Christian policy in this area is not dominant. So we have to do something. And the answer was they were still advocating for, yeah, you have to get your people on to school boards, you have to get your people on to library boards and local politics…
Jonathan Walton: Seven Mountain Strategy.
Sy Hoekstra: But it wasn't that, right? The Seven Mountain Strategy is something much more explicit and much more like… That is a smaller section of White, like charismatic, Pentecostal evangelicalism, sort of.
Jonathan Walton: Right right right.
Sy Hoekstra: So anyways that's what we need to do, it is constantly White people who have any amount of power, it’s constantly our instinct to separate ourselves from the ones who are the real bad people. Instead of saying, actually how does our culture reflect the things that we see as bad? How do we kind of take in those ideas or how do we implement those ideas in subtler ways? And we just need to do the latter. We need to figure out the ways that Jesus is not ruling over any aspect of our life [laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: And get him in charge of that part of our life. So that's kind of my plug for my fellow White people.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. I agree. I think that looking at South Africa and how the equivalent of their Orthodox church made part of the Catechism a renunciation of apartheid. Because I think they recognized if you are South African and you decide to come to faith in South Africa, you need to renounce all other allegiances. So when you're baptized in the United States or I guess in my tradition, Black church and then a downstream-of-evangelicalism, non-denominational church, before you're baptized you say, “Do you affirm that Jesus is your Lord and Savior?” You say yes. And they say, “Do you renounce the devil and all his works?” You say yes. And I think that repentance and contextualized renunciation would make a lot of sense for people who are in this country, particularly if we're not just calling people to faith in Christ, but calling people into the kingdom of God.
I think there needs to be systemic contextualized renunciation in word and deed with power. Like I need to, in the United States, renounce patriarchy as a man. I need to renounce meritocracy as a man. I need to renounce ableism as an able-bodied person. I need to renounce and reject these things in word and deed in power, and not just say that they're bad, and then live my life in benefit of those systems. I think at minimum, there's deliverance by the power of the Spirit. And then in Jesus name, there is discipleship out of these things into the creation of a new world and reflection of the kingdom, and which I would just love to see happen.
Sy Hoekstra: [Laughs].
Jonathan Walton: Yeah [laughs].
Sy Hoekstra: I think kind of what you're saying is to just say that something is bad, and to reject it very often leads to a limiting of self-reflection.
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: So I then think, there's not just the idea of Christian nationalism, but there's lots of other things that Christian nationalists and lots of other people share in common that you're just not thinking about, because you're so focused on them. So like a lot of White Christians share in common with Christian nationalism or with Christian nationalists, deep dislike of immigrants [laughs]. Or maybe it's a lesser dislike of immigrants than an explicit Christian nationalist, but like deep suspicion about it, colorblindness would be something [laughs] that pretty much any conservative White Christian shares with Christian nationalists, that is actually doing a lot of harm to people.
America's colonialism or outsized power on the world stage, all those things are totally fine with a lot of White Christians. It's just there are so many things that you're not thinking about when you are, you're not reflecting on when you are saying I've rejected Christian nationalism, and therefore I can sort of go back to thinking that my position is totally fine.
White Christians Overemphasize Statements and Beliefs, And Underemphasize Acting Justly
Jonathan Walton: Yep. I've said it's bad. I've done enough.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. I mean, and in general, White Christians have kind of a problem with believing that beliefs and stated beliefs are enough. Not just when it comes to politics. That's what we believe about being a true Christian. You just state the right things, you just believe the right doctrine. That's the most important thing when it comes to following Jesus, is just believing stuff. That is a bias or a bent or a problem that we encounter in many areas of our lives. We tend toward the dualistic intellectual way of approaching problems in the way that we think and that is very much an inheritance that we get from the Enlightenment in Europe.
Jonathan Walton: Yes. Oh, and last thing is it does harm for both of those things. So for example, when we do that, statements become the biggest thing and nothing outside of that. So for an evangelical church in the United States right now to make a statement, to put something on a website about George Floyd or Nex Benedict or anything like that, it becomes a huge deal to write a statement, which does effectively nothing.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.
Jonathan Walton: And it becomes a huge deal when a statement isn't made, which still doesn't do anything for people who are marginalized and oppressed. So there is this prioritization of the written word and just saying things that does not have material change, it does not spark or cause material change for people that are actually in oppression. Like it, we must literally do more. That's why “the Word became flesh” is an amazing doctrine. That Jesus would literally become like us, move into our neighborhoods, and be close. So I pray that we're able to do that.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. If you're a White person with an intellectual inheritance from Europe, if you want something that the more you think about it the more it will utterly baffle you, is the idea when Jesus says, “I am the truth.” When a person, when an entity says, I am the truth, and not, “Here is the truth,” and then following a series of statements [laughs]. That will… I can tell you from personal experience, that'll mess up the way you think about the world [laughter].
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Outro and Outtake
Sy Hoekstra: Okay, Jonathan, I think we're going to leave it there. We're going to skip our segment this month of Which Tab Is Still Open. It's funny, I didn't even have us in the outline at the beginning bring up that we were doing the segment. I kind of forgot that, but I think I subconsciously knew that we would just have way too much to say about this subject [laughs]. Because the reality is the tab that is still open for us always is this whole subject ever since 2020 when we put out the anthology that started this company, like this is kind of fundamental stuff that we talk about all the time. So we're not going to do that segment. We are soon for subscribers going to be launching monthly conversations that you can have with us.
Meaning we will put out basically kind of like a zoom link. It won't be on Zoom, it'll be on Google Meet probably, that you can come to, to just talk with us about anything. We would love to talk about this subject more and hear what more people have to say about it. And you'll get more details on those from us soon. That'll be something that you as paid subscribers have access to and we would love to see you there. Just as a quick reminder, please go to Apple or Spotify, give us five stars. That helps us so much. Give us a written review if you're on Apple podcasts because they let you do that there. But please continue, we've seen it you know a handful more on each platform as we've been asking for this and we would love for there to be more because it really does help us and helps people discover us, it gives us sort of credibility that you value what we're doing.
So if you do value what we're doing go to Apple or Spotify, give us a five star review. Thank you so much for listening. Our theme song as always as “Citizens” by John Guerra. Our transcripts are by Joyce Ambale. Our podcast art is by Robyn Burgess and we will see you all for our next bonus episode in April.
[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/ That it will roll in abundance/ And that you’re building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]
Sy Hoekstra: Okay. Are we good?
Jonathan Walton: Yes.
Sy Hoekstra: Am I in camera okay?
Jonathan Walton: Yes, you look as wonderful as you could possibly look.
Sy Hoekstra: Oh, that… is that a compliment [laughs]?
Jonathan Walton: It is. Yeah.
Sy Hoekstra: “You have reached the ceiling of how good you can look. Where you are now, don't get excited, you're not going beyond this.”
Jonathan Walton: Oh, that is not what I meant [laughter]. That’s not what I meant. You look as great as you could today. Like that's, you look wonderful. It’s great.
Sy Hoekstra: [sounding unconvinced] Thanks… Thanks, Jonathan.
Share this post